


Jack of Spades

by eurydice72



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Community: trope_bingo, M/M, Poker
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-19
Updated: 2013-02-19
Packaged: 2017-11-29 20:11:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/690965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eurydice72/pseuds/eurydice72
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nobody can play him like Haymitch Abernathy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jack of Spades

**Author's Note:**

> Set during the 74th Hunger Games. Written for the strip poker/poker prompt on my trope_bingo card.

Blood sells, but not this kind, never this. Seneca stares at the screens and tries not to imagine what Snow must be thinking, because that way lies madness. He can tolerate the deaths of children ( _all for the greater good_ ), and he can block out the nightmares if the drugs are good enough, but this is here, this is now, in the midst of his Games, when all Capitol eyes are on the drama he creates, not on the righteous shouts of angry men.

Another Peacekeeper falls under the fury of District 11.

Seneca buries his head in his hands and mouths a silent prayer.

He’s meant to be sleeping, but the riots created upon the little girl’s death have kept him glued to the transmissions, wondering when the call will come to demand his return to the control room. Snow had been the one to alert him, sending him the private link to watch the riots unfold, his command simple and direct.

Fix it.

Spinning mob violence is simple. His team is the best in the business at that. All they have to do is delay televising it until the Peacekeepers have control again, then edit it accordingly.

It’s the root of District 11’s hatred, however, that locks him into this fugue. Never in all his years has he been witness to such a mass unleashing, and all because of that Rue.

No. That’s wrong.

All because of that Katniss.

She is the one who inspired the bread, an act unparalleled in all of the Games’ history. She is the one who sang for a fallen tribute, the one who exacted her first kill not for survival or bloodthirst but retaliation.

She stands alone, the best hope District 12 has had in twenty-four years. The only other tribute with support numbers even close to Katniss’s is the boy who’d die for her, and he is closing in fast from his recent sacrifices.

It’s been riveting drama, the sort awards are made for. Any other time, he would be preening.

When a knock comes at his door, he ignores it. He has another hour before he must return, and without knowing how he’ll proceed, he has no wish to cut that short. If it’s an emergency, his assistant knows to ring his private line. The show goes on, so he does not.

The knock comes again. Harder.

Seneca squeezes his eyes shut.

A voice accompanies the third knock, less than a minute later. His heart leaps at the rasp that has haunted his dreams since boyhood.

“I know you’re in there,” Haymitch says. “And I’m not going away until I see you. It’s your call how many people notice I’m here before you do.”

Nobody can play him like Haymitch Abernathy. Seneca bolts from his chair and crosses to the door before witnesses can take whispers back to Snow.

The bastard looks good, leaning against the doorframe like he owns the place. He’s cleaned up this year, his eyes brighter than Seneca has ever seen them, his clothes unrumpled. More astounding than that, there isn’t a single whiff of alcohol on him.

Seneca has no doubt it’s all because of that Katniss, too. Which terrifies him even more. Because if she can inspire hope in someone as lost as Haymitch, the rest of them didn’t stand a chance.

“What do you want?” No point in beating around the bush.

“Thought you might want some company.”

His traitorous flesh flushes hot at the offer, his lungs the worst culprit as air becomes the enemy. How many years has he longed to hear Haymitch say something like that to him? Ever since he was a boy and he watched the dark horse from District 12 defeat all odds to become a Victor.

The Second Quarter Quell is the sole reason he became a Gamemaker. And Haymitch knows it.

“I’m resting,” he says, but it sounds like a lie even as it falls from his lips.

The sardonic smile vanishes. “It’s nice that someone can.” He straightens and ventures a step forward, over the threshold and into Seneca’s space, but Seneca can’t bring himself to back off. “We need to talk.”

“Talk.”

“That’s what I said.”

Seneca glances into the empty corridor behind him. If only this wasn’t happening now. If only Haymitch had come to him before the Games had begun.

Except Haymitch wouldn’t have, because Seneca hadn’t mattered enough then.

Silently, he edges aside, allowing Haymitch room to enter. The click of the door, blocking them from the rest of the world, is as deadly as Snow’s stare.

“Your tributes are doing well this year,” he says, in a desperate bid to maintain his self-control.

“They’re survivors, those two.” Haymitch doesn’t stop moving as he speaks, wandering around the periphery of the room, picking up knickknacks, leaving his invisible mark on everything Seneca possesses. “Ratings good?”

“Excellent.”

Because of Katniss and the boy, and they both know it.

Haymitch rounds the end of the couch and flops down in the middle of it. As relaxed as his pose is, his eyes bore into Seneca. “I have a proposition for you.”

“No.” He can’t hear this. He can’t be compromised.

“Hear me out.”

“I can’t. You know that. It’s against the—”

“Fuck the rules.” When Haymitch smiles, Seneca doesn’t see the surly sot he’s been able to replace the object of his fantasies with. He sees the sixteen-year-old boy again, the one who made a fool of a Gamemaker by turning the arena against his opponent, the boy who made Seneca yearn to be that brave. “What’s the point of being in charge if you can’t make the game your own?”

“The Games are the Capitol’s.”

“The arena is yours.”

Seneca bites his tongue to stop from arguing.

“You lose either one of those kids, and your ratings will go through the floor,” Haymitch says.

“Only one can win.”

“Really?”

And then he knows. He knows what Haymitch wants without him having to utter another word. Because he’s spent a lifetime studying the Games, its tributes and Victors, and most of all, Haymitch Abernathy. He knows how the man thinks, when others underestimate him as the drunk he plays for their entertainment. He understands—and has all along—why Haymitch chose this particular role, and though it’s been years since he learned all those personal details about his favorite Victor, the facts you couldn’t find on the trading cards or in the magazines, his heart still breaks a little for him.

He shakes his head before he can talk himself into it. “No.”

“You don’t know what I’m proposing.”

“You want them both to win.”

“Doesn’t every mentor?”

No, Seneca wants to say, and especially not Haymitch. No other tribute from District 12 has ever inspired this drive from him.

In that moment, Seneca hates Katniss Everdeen for being the one to finally crack through Haymitch’s walls.

It doesn’t last. It can’t. Because those cracks are what have also driven Haymitch to him.

“Think of it,” Haymitch presses. “The young lovers from District 12, fighting to survive so they can have a future together once the Games are over. Your audience will eat it up.”

He’s liked the young love angle from the start. It hasn’t been done before, and the boy practically glows whenever he looks at Katniss. Approval scores skyrocketed after the interviews, and then again when he’d done what he could to protect her in the arena.

When he doesn’t answer right away, Haymitch sits up. “Tell you what.” Slipping a hand into his coat pocket, he pulls out a deck of cards and sets them on the table between them. “I’ll play you for it. Five-card draw. I win, you find a way to give them both a chance.”

And now he really can’t, because this is it, this is Haymitch’s infamous poker game, the one everybody knows about but nobody mentions. The game is how Haymitch always dealt with the demands made on Victors, the bargains struck for the right price. As much as Seneca has always craved time with Haymitch, he’s hated the means by which he had to get it.

Buy a game of poker with Haymitch. The stakes—winner’s choice.

Haymitch always lost.

As far as Seneca knows, there hasn’t been a game in years. Haymitch’s drinking has dissuaded even his most ardent admirers.

“What if I win?” His voice is a croak.

With a crooked grin, Haymitch tilts his head and just looks at Seneca. Because they both understand what the price inevitably is.

_Haymitch always loses._

With his heart in his throat, Seneca takes the seat opposite and reaches for the cards. “I’ll shuffle.”

Haymitch shrugs and slouches back again, legs sprawled. In spite of the years and the abuse he’s wreaked on his flesh, his legs are still trim, the bulge of his heavy cock evident against his thigh. 

Seneca’s hands shake as he almost fumbles the cards.

When he starts dealing, Haymitch doesn’t even look. His Seam eyes see all, always have, even when a teenaged Seneca begged him for an autograph the night after he lost his sixteenth tribute.

Ten cards rest between them. 

Six tributes remain in the arena.

Sixteen has always been Seneca’s lucky number.

Haymitch’s lashes duck once, but his posture never changes. “Looks like you win.”

The cards don’t lie, but Seneca can’t believe them. His pair of fives beats Haymitch’s jack-of-spades-high hand of nothing.

“But—”

“A shame,” Haymitch says. “That finale could’ve been spectacular. A pair of Careers facing off with a couple kids who just want to be together? You would’ve had the best ratings the Games have ever seen.”

But as Haymitch begins peeling off his jacket, the possibilities have taken root in Seneca’s brain. He’d forgotten about Cato and Clove, but they add a dimension to the story that even Snow can’t ignore. 

“Stop.” Hurriedly, Seneca gathers up the cards and dumps them into Haymitch’s lap, ignoring the bulge and the strain of his broad shoulders against his shirt. “I’ll do it.”

“But you won.”

“And this is what I want for it.” He begins pacing around, sorting out the mental list of who he needs to talk to, to back him when Snow balks. Because he has no doubt Snow _will_ balk. Caesar will love it, which means Claudius will fall right into line afterward, and if they let it slip to the right people, he can have enough of a public outcry for the star-crossed lovers to merit making a rule change within the next two hours. “It’s brilliant.”

“It’ll make you the most remembered Gamemaker in the Games’ history.”

He meets Haymitch’s eyes. It would also put Haymitch in his debt. “They could still die, you know.”

“I know.” Haymitch lurches to his feet. “But this way, they actually stand a chance.”

Seneca follows him to the door. The faster he gets rid of Haymitch, the sooner he can put it in motion. There, however, Haymitch stops and glances back, as if he’s only just thought of something.

“Tell you what. Once the Games are over, why don’t you and I have a private drink? My treat.”

He does his best not to stutter like a lovestruck youth. “I’d like that.”

With a nod and that crooked smile, Haymitch is gone.

Seneca dashes for the phone once he is alone. Caesar will be getting ready for the evening recap—

He jerks to a halt. Haymitch dropped one of the cards on his way out. Slowly, Seneca bends down and picks it up.

The jack of spades looks up at him.


End file.
